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So, both sides of a story can't be said, only the sympathetic ones? It is never the fault of a business owner when the business goes under, it must be the fault of the bank, or the government, or someone else? Sorry, I don't buy it.

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I decided that after a month's hiatus and skipping a couple of fishing reports I should throw another one in, just to be me.

Yesterday it was almost 70 here, sunny skies, spring on the way, and this morning I woke up to find 4" of new snow on the ground.

I like snow. It keeps the fairweather anglers at home, which leaves more room on the streams for us insane types.

Headed down to the Gunny, and lo, it was deserted. One truck in the parking lot but they had vanished upstream long since, from the tracks. Water way down from last time, roughly half of the flow the last time I went down. Midges on the water but no risers to speak of. Lightly snowing, just cold enough to ice the guides.

Spotty fishing, which was a bit surprising. Some evidence the rainbows have started to spawn, but with the huge change in flows this past week, it might stir things up a bit. I saw a couple old redds and no new ones, even though I know the bows are in there. Then agian I can't find my sunglasses, so there could be redds all over that I missed seeing.

Landed a couple dozen fish in about 6 hours on the water. Didn't keep count, but I do recall I LDR'd about that many as well. Landed one bow that was in the 24" range, big male in spawning colors, complete with kype. Lost another fish that looked about that size or even bigger, in almost the same spot. Might have been pairing up ready to spawn.

Good mix of browns and bows today, roughly half and half. The browns topped out at about 18", with most in the 12-14" range. Bows ran a bit bigger, average about 16" or so. No bugs but midges on the water, but I keep hoping the BWOs will arrive. Today's flies were the standard winter D-bugger with a glo bug or san juan worm dropper, with fish taking all three of those.

I have the crud. No idea what kind of crud, but some kind. A couple other people at work have had it, and some of their kids, so it is not too surprising. Sniffly, coughing a bit, run down, the usual winter stuff. Spent all day yesterday asleep, then couldn't sleep last night. Got up for a bit today, ran into work to see if anything was critical, then came back and crawled back into the nest.

Got up around 1, felt a bit better but still not great. Nice and sunny outside, upper 30s, calm. Decided some sun might do me good, so I went down to the river.

Fished for about an hour, before I ran out of steam. Landed 5 rainbows, two in the 12" range and three that were 16-17". Also landed two browns, one about 12" and one about 15". Every fish took a glo bug, nothing ate anything else. Water was high, still 2100 cfs.

As I left, the bunnies came out into the parking lot to taunt me. They know they are safe there.

Today was an exciting day at work, making maps for a meeting with DOW on some coal projects on Monday, getting ready for the writeup for those coal projects, and fixing the blade on the ATV plow...

There is only so much of that I can take, so a little after 1 I gave up and ran home, and moseyed down to the river in the blizzard.

Water is way high, 2100 fps, and the guides iced up in a hurry. I managed to stand it for about 90 minutes or so, during which time I landed 4 trout on a variety of flies. Saw a couple risers, but due to a beaver's pantry pile of sticks, couldn't get a drift over them.

Hiking back to the truck, a couple bunnies hopped out in front of me on the trail and gave their lives for stew and camera traps. After I got back to the truck, I decided to drive up the hill and see about another bunny that has given me the slip several times, always from one bush down one hole in the desert. It wasn't there, but several others were, and I managed to get one more cottontail before it got dark, and discovered a new place to hunt down there.

I had a meeting today down in the valley, which pretty much shoots the whole day when it happens, so I decided to take advantage of the few extra hours I put on the clock last week and take the morning for myself. Plan A was to get up at 0 dark-30 and drive the hour and a half to the Unc to fish at dawn, my usual approach.

8 pm last night the blizzard hit, 40 mph winds and blowing and drifting snow, and the temperature dropped from about 35 to who knows what. Hmmm.

0420, alarm goes off. Look outside, no new snow since about 9 pm last night, but it sure looks cold. Checked on the internet, 10 degrees in Montrose with two and a half hours of night left.

Back to bed.

Got up at 620, took a shower, got my stuff together, checked the net again. 6 in Montrose. Sheesh.

Stopped in at work and picked up the materials for the meeting. Headed down the hill, to discover that the blizzard had hit all through the valley, and there was an inch of ice on the roads the whole way.

Finally got to the river about 9 am, bright sunlight, 6 inches of new powder drifted deeper in spots, and nobody in front of me. Then I got out to pay the park pass fee, and discovered why. Definitely on the low side of cold.

I managed to hit it for an hour and a half before giving up. With the sun out, I was hot and sweaty, but whenever I hit a shadow, I would start to chill again. The water was gin clear, unusually so, and low, about 50 CFS. No visible fish lying on the bottom like usual, either. I dredged a bugger and an egg in half a dozen runs, had one solid grab, and missed that one.

After two long days at work and a definite lack of enthusiasm over office work (and breaking the snowplow on the ATV A couple times), I gave up and went fishing.

34 degrees, water a whole lot higher than normal for this time of year (making room for the snowmelt next spring), and three vehicles just leaving. Not sure if they had been fishing, or what. One rig across the river but no sign of anyone.

Waded across and tossed in a slumpbuster with a red SJW dropper. First cast, 14" rainbow, six feet off the bank on the worm. Now, EVERY SINGLE time I have ever caught a fish on the first cast, I have ended up having a basically lousy day. Great.

Dredged up a brown about ten casts later, this one about 16", also on the worm. Then..... nothing. No hits, no rises, no nothing. Fished up a couple hundred yards, then hoofed it up by the big olive tree to try that hole. Managed to scrape up two browns, one on the worm and one on the slumpbuster, both about 10" long.

Back downstream, stripping the slumpbuster, no hits. Tried a midge pupa dropper on 6x, as there were midges on the water, and nothing. Switched to a glo bug, and first cast, 16" rainbow. On the slumbuster I had run through that spot about 100 times already. Go figure.

No other hits in the next fifteen minutes, so I decided to call it a day.

Back to the truck and changed out of the waders. On the drive in, I had seen a cottontail by a lone bush out in the flats on top of the canyon, so I drove back up and parked, got out the .22 pistol, and went looking for him. Nothing there, of course, but some interesting bushes around, so I kept looking. Walked a mile and a half or so, kicked up three bunnies, and got two of them. Then after I got in the truck and drove up the road, the missing first bunny hopped out and looked at me. Too close to the road, of course, and already too dark. Oh well.